Some updates

The computer is cooperating . . . for now.

This is the finished square for Primitive Needle Lisa's memorial quilt. I couldn't find the picture to show off when it was completed.



The wording is from the epitaph for Kathleen "Kick" Kennedy, and I think it is probably the nicest thing you could say about someone who has passed away. I hope our work gives her family a bit of solace. She is so missed.

I also finished Part 2 of CItA.




I started Part 3 on Wednesday night. It's moving surprisingly quickly. I love how she includes the stitch diagrams on the charts. It really helps to see how things are supposed to go, much easier than surfing the net for instructions. I betcha if she included turkeywork instructions, I wouldn't run screaming from them.


We spent the weekend in Gettysburg, camping. It was a relaxing time for me. We went on a ghost tour of the Jenny Wade home. Jenny was the only civilian casualty of the battle, shot in her sister's home while baking bread. The story of her death, and the family's struggle to survive, is fascinating. I enjoyed the tour, but I didn't see any ghosts, didn't have any creepy hap'nins. Left-brain kept sticking his finger in the bullet holes, and I kept expecting someone ghostly to bop him in the head, but no dice. Perhaps they found him intimidating? I feel so blessed that Gettysburg is so close to us, about 28 miles, so it's easy to get there, and it does have an other-worldly beauty to it. I plan on going back and taking a different tour, if not with the goal of seeing ghosts, just to find out more about that moment in American history.

I did take along Brave Hearts to work on. It rained on Saturday afternoon, so we were confined to the camper. I turned the TV on and stitched while Left-brain napped.(And yes, it might not be roughin' it to sit in a camper with a fridge, and cable TV, and screened windows, but we ARE on vacation, why make it a struggle to relax, LOL? I've washed my hair in the same bucket of water the horses drank out of, I got zippy to prove!)I am making good progress, and hope to have it finished this week. I will save the next picture update til it's finished.

I've been trying to be good here lately with my S.E.X. purchases. I stay off E-bay, and, when I do shop, if something catches my eye, it has to be something really special for me to buy it. I'm kind of proud of myself in that. I'd really like to start making dents in my UFO/WIP pile before the end of the year. I feel good that I've finished a few old projects this year, but there is so much more to do. I can pretty up the projects, put them in nice storage boxes, but they're still there. And buying new projects and starting them just doesn't feel right right now. Does anyone else feel this way? It's probably for the best, but it's a different place for me to be.

I tried

I came home last night with my finished Part 2 of CItA, and went to upload the photos onto here, so I could share my progress, instead of having to just describe it, and, not only was Blogger freaking out, my computer decided that, although the Internet connection was good, it didn't want to get on the Internet. Apparently, I am not meant to share my stitching, at least not right now. ARRRRGGGHHHHHH! I hate this.

As I said, I have finished Part 2, so I started Part 3 last night. It's a much easier stitch so far; fewer specialty stitches, and no metallic. Whoot whoot. I hate that DMC metallic. A strong word, but I dislike it immensely. I like the effect, just not the delivery method.

I'm on the last day of my epic work marathon. 12 straight days of work has got me beat. I know other people do this for far longer, and, as a youngun with vet bills for three kittens and a puppy, I worked far longer stretches than this, but I'm a lot older than I used to be, so it's harder on me. But, when I was fighting to not fall back asleep this morning, I told myself I have tomorrow off, and my only tasks are to take my car for emissions testing, go to the grocery store, and relax for the rest of the weekend. One good thing, at least these extra hours have put me very close to being able to afford my computer. At least my panic attacks are for something.

I did get a lot of reading done over the time though.

Half-broke Horses has been in my "to-be-read" pile for a few months. I read The Glass Castle and found myself so angry at the parents that I gave the book away right away. And didn't regret it. But this was a much better book, with an interesting pioneer woman, Lily Casey Smith, the author's grandmother. It did help explain how the mom in the the other book got to be how she was, but I still don't want to ever read GC again.

Exes and Ohs is what I'm reading right now. The author was on an MTV reality show I never watched. I have no idea why I picked this book up, but it seemed interesting at the time. I had a few doubts about the author when I started reading her tales of dating in the big city, but, really, how could you leave a book with a line like, "It was just a few days before October 31, and none of my friends had come up with costumes yet. . . I suggested we go as a group of something. My top ideas were the Golden Girls . . . the A-Team, or Pete Wentz."(71). This in a chapter when she is questioning why she never got the memo that you're supposed to dress trampy for Halloween. It's definitely on the low-end of the memoirs I've read, and I admit, it's embarrassing to tote a book whose cover is emblazened with condoms (she has a store of Magnum condoms under her bed because she was hired to host parties for the company, and it freaks out her dates) to work, but it's actually a funny book, and I do see parts of my dating life in her stories. It's kinda nice to read that I wasn't the only one who ever went through those experiences. It's a fun, quick, summer read, perfect for August.

I'm going to try to work out this stupid computer issue, but if it doesn't work itself out soon, I sense a trip to Best Buy in my future.